


One Step Forward

by flinchflower



Series: Slash Me Twice [36]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Caretaking, M/M, Prayer, Psychic Abilities, Training, Wincest - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-13
Updated: 2013-10-13
Packaged: 2017-12-29 06:31:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1002090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flinchflower/pseuds/flinchflower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt 36: Progress.  Sam's working with Pastor Jim to control his psychic abilities.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Step Forward

Jim looks with compassion at the young man slumped over the table in front of him.

“Don’t take it so hard, Sam. You’ve made a lot of progress in the past couple of days, I’m proud of you.”

As he expected, the praise gets Sam to pick his head up a little.

“Sam, you spent three days with Missouri drilling you in meditation and focusing exercises, and you’ve been here with me another three doing the same, not to mention learning new prayers and incantations. Let’s go out to the sitting room, I’ll tell you a little story.”

He busies himself with pouring another mug of tea for himself and the boy, debating. John’s not going to be happy, but he thinks the boy needs to hear. He’ll just give Sam a little warning about that. He hands the sturdy mug to Sam, waiting until the young man is holding the handle securely before he backs away. He hasn’t missed how the boy’s hands are trembling. Jim leans back in his favorite recliner, watching him for a few moments.

“Missouri, she taught you the practical bit, Sam, how to shield yourself from having the visions triggered by the everyday people and lives around you. It’s not something you should always shut out, by any means, but you’re smart enough to know when and where you should be open and receptive, I trust you for that.” He ignores the mutter for the moment, the one that sounded suspiciously like Sam complaining that he’s the only one who does. “What I’m teaching you… Sam, it’s what the chaplain taught me, stateside, before I went over to ‘Nam. When your father and brother come back, I’ll teach you what I learned there.”

Sam’s stunned. None of his father’s old buddies talk about Vietnam, that code of honor among veterans still holding their silence all these decades later, silence that was held at first to protect themselves from the censure that so many soldiers encountered as they returned, and grew into habit. He wants to ask more, he’s got a thousand questions lined up, but years of watching what the occasional question does to his father keeps them locked down. His silence is rewarded.

“It’s the reason I know how to help hunters,” Jim states quietly. “Know what it’s like in combat. Chaplain told me, before that plane left the ground, that I had to know how to find God in the middle of hell itself, and he wasn’t wrong - I know how to prep men for finding themselves in that hell, Sam, I just don’t normally train them in how to latch onto St. Michael’s wings and hold tight enough to make him scream.”

He’s pinned to his chair by the raw words, can’t breathe, feels all the muscles of his body responding to the emotion in Jim’s voice. Sam’s drowning in the sensation of being exposed, his front of anger and sullenness ripped to shreds, and yet at the same time he feels the warm buzz of protection, the soft ripple to the air around him as if an angel did have sheltering wings wrapped around him. The words of St. Michael’s prayer scream through his veins, and he finds himself murmuring softly, words in time with Jim’s.

Sancte Michael Archangele,  
defende nos in proelio.  
contra nequitiam et insidias diaboli esto praesidium.  
Imperet illi Deus, supplices deprecamur:  
tuque, Princeps militiae coelestis,  
Satanam aliosque spiritus malignos,  
qui ad perditionem animarum pervagantur in mundo,  
divina virtute, in infernum detrude.  
Amen.

There’s silence as they finish the prayer, and Sam can’t get the image of Dean to leave his mind, the image of Dean and his father on their hunt, and Jim’s kneeling at Sam’s side.

“Reach for it, Sam, let the barrier down.”

“I’m afraid,” he whispers.

“I’m here,” is Jim’s simple reply, and he closes a hand around Sam’s white knuckles, and Sam can feel the rosary beads pressing into the back of his hand. He leans back, and relaxes, relaxes his mind, the protections Missouri and Jim taught him. Jim braces both of them against a fall as Sam’s body is wracked by tremors, and he lets out a moan of pain. Jim whispers to him, reminders to relax, reminders to breathe, and it seems to work, because moments later, Sam’s eyes are clearing, and he’s staring at Jim.

“I need to call Dad.”

Jim simply reaches over, hits the send button on the boy’s phone. As he waits, he holds tight to his own lifeline, the radio line to God that so many of the soldiers overseas would tease him about, on lieu days down in the cities. He listens to the boy speak.

“Dad. I know it’s the middle of the night. Yes, I know you’re on a stakeout. Shut up and listen.” Jim hears the outraged squawk of John’s voice through the phone. “Dad. You and Dean need to stay together – would you listen to me? Dammit, give me Dean.” Jim tries not to chuckle. Dean’s taken Sam’s new talents in stride far better than John has. “Dean. You and Dad stay together. There aren’t two of them, there’s four, and you need to leave the shotguns with the silver in the car. It’s not werewolves. No, they’re creatures. You’re gonna need the crossbows instead, you don’t want to get near them. Yes, I saw it. Yes, Jim’s here. Make Dad listen – yeah. Here he is.” Sam wipes a weary hand over his eyes, and hands the phone over.

Jim takes a few minutes to reassure Dean that yes, he knows how to take care of Sam, and knows how to soothe the migraines the visions leave in their wake, and then another few minutes reassuring John that yes, they have things under control, it’s part of what they were working on for the evening. Sam’s nearly asleep when Jim turns back to him. 

“Now, Sam, build the walls back up, step back inside – focus, boy,” he says softly, and he’s relieved that Sam’s able to focus enough to do so. Sam’s hand go to his head though, and Jim knows they’re through for the night. He helps the boy into the bedroom, lays him down after giving him a medication he suspects Sam hasn’t had the benefit of before, something that should help the migraine. He smoothes the hair away from Sam’s eyes and gets a wry smile from the boy, reminding him that Dean and John both do the same thing. He doesn’t regret it, though, as the boy drops off to sleep, and Jim murmurs a protective prayer over his head. Sam’s come a long way, but there’s more progress to be made before the more impulsive half of the family comes home.


End file.
